Thursday, 3 October 2013

Anwar on A-G report: As Malaysians suffer, BN continues plunder

As the average Malaysian struggles to cope with
inflation, Putrajaya has continued to squander taxpayers money by
mishandling public projects and abusing federal funds, Datuk Seri Anwar
Ibrahim alleged today as he weighed in on the latest findings in the
Auditor-General’s 2012 report.
To the opposition leader, the A-G’s latest report had shown that
financial mismanagement under the Najib administration had only worsened
last year, resulting in more billions lost.
This, he pointed out, comes following a lack of action against those at
fault for the alleged abuses, despite similar findings in past federal
audits.
“We want to know why is it worsening. The ministers should be held
responsible as the discrepancies are happening right before them.
“We don’t want the government to just tell us ‘yes we are
investigating’,” Anwar, who is also a former deputy prime minister, told
reporters in Parliament here.
He said the BN government has neither given any guarantee that it will
act on the findings of the report, nor has Prime Minister Datuk Seri
Najib Razak given his assurance that there will be no recurrence of such
discrepancies in managing taxpayers money in the future.
“Where is the guarantee by the PM that this will not happen again?” Anwar charged.
“This shows greediness of our leaders in plundering and squandering the nation’s wealth,” he added.
In a repeat of past criticisms, the A-G Report 2012 highlighted
numerous financial discrepancies in almost all the key government
agencies, with a few found to have flopped in projects worth billions of
ringgit.
The report also highlighted poor contract and procurement management in
government projects, an issue also raised by the Public Accounts
Committee (PAC) members who were briefed about the matter the day the
national audit report was released.
Anwar urged the PAC to take firm action against government agencies found to have misappropriated public funds.
“We hope PAC is firm on this matter. We also urge the MACC to act,” he
said, referring to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.
But PAC chairman Datuk Nur Jazlan Mohamad argued that not everything highlighted in the report involved corruption.
“We must try and erase that perception that every item found in the
report has corruption elements. We need to eliminate this perception,”
he told a press conference two days ago.
Nur Jazlan suggested that some of the issues highlighted in the report may be due to “mistakes”.
“If you make a mistake, just admit it. Problem is they never admitted to their mistakes in the past,” added.
When asked if the PAC would recommend strong action against the
implicated agencies, Nur Jazlan said the committee would consider but
stressed the need to study the report thoroughly before making any
decisions.
The PAC is scheduled to meet again on October 21 and is expected to
discuss the A-G’s report and decide its next course of action.
The PAC — a committee comprising both BN and opposition lawmakers — has
previously been accused of lacking the political will to push for
action as it failed to follow up on strong cases of financial
irregularities involving key ministries.
Past PAC chiefs have denied the allegation and said their powers were
limited to issuing recommendations for action and not prosecution.